The Choice
by greenleaf-in-bloom
Summary: Harry has a choice. Voldemort has taken he and Sirius, and Sirius has an idea his godson doesn't like. COMPLETE! Thanks to OotP, an AU.
1. Part One: The Choice

Tough Choices   
Tough Choices   
  
Disclaimer: I. Do. Not. Own. This.   
  
The torch in the corner was going out, and it was too high for either of them to reach it, even if Harry stood on top of Sirius' shoulders. The walls were impenetrable, made of a dark stone.   
  
"Do you have your wand?"   
  
"Yeah. He didn't take it. Why?"   
  
"Give it to me."   
  
"What're you going to do, Sirius?"   
  
Sirius shook his head, glancing around again for a door.   
  
"We can't affect the room, though. What are you going to do?"   
  
"Harry, you know if he gets a chance to torture me, he'll get the Keys."   
  
Harry nodded miserably.   
  
"If he gets the Keys, then everyone at Hogwarts and the Ministry is going to die."   
  
"Yeah."   
  
"So he can't get a chance to torture me."   
  
"Yeah, but he's too quick. We can't hex him in time, or kill him."   
  
"I don't want to kill him," Sirius said grimly, a determined look on his face.   
  
"No," Harry said, eyes widening, staring incredulously at his godfather. "Sirius, you can't."   
  
"Yes I can," Sirius insisted. "If I don't, then three thousand people will be dead by nightfall."   
  
"No!" Harry repeated, shaking his head furiously. "There's another way. There has to be."   
  
"We can't disapperate. I can't transform."   
  
"If I attack him -"   
  
"Then he'll defend himself until he can either get your wand, sheild himself, or torture me enough. But he won't attack you outright until he's killed everyone."   
  
"Sirius, don't be crazy. I'm not going to let you kill yourself!"   
  
"Then do it for me."   
  
"What?"   
  
"I said do it for me! Let the Keys be lost, don't let him get them!"   
  
"No, Sirius. I can't do that. I could never do that."   
  
"You could have in the Shreiking Shack."   
  
"I'm not going to let you die!"   
  
Sirius looked down, and sat on the cold floor. "Then Voldemort has already won," he said softly, defeat and loss in his eyes, "and I will die a worthless murderer." Harry stood stiffly across the room, shaking his head in denial.   
  
"Harry, do you have any idea what's going to happen in exactly fifteen minutes?"   
  
Harry stopped shaking his head and didn't answer.   
  
"Voldemort is going to walk through that door. And then he's going to point his wand at me, or someone else's wand, even, and he's going to say Crucio. Then he's going to say it again. And again. And again. And I will break. You will watch him do it, and you will watch me hand him the Keys. And then you will watch as he smiles, and walks out of the room. And before nightfall Hogwarts will burn. Do you know who is going to die? All your teachers, all your friends, everyone you know. And the Ministry will burn. Three thousand people, Harry, and they're all going to die if you don't hand me that wand right now."   
  
Trembling, Harry didn't answer or move. Sirius plunged on.   
  
"Not just the students, and not just the teachers, and not just all the Ministry officials. But their families, their children. You will see it and dream of it and know that you could have prevented it. You will watch as Voldemort knocks in the door, and as he stands in front of a weeping, pleading mother who is protecting her infant child. As he kills the mother, and then as he lifts the child and holds it around the throat and digs his fingers into its tiny throat and it sqirms and screams as blood runs down its neck until it dies. Then as he turns to the terrified six-year-old standing in the corner, a Death Eater on either side of her, both smiling cruelly and holding her shoulders.   
  
"You can watch in your dreams as she cries out and struggles and kicks, and then as Voldemort says softly to her that he is only going to say two sweet little words to her, you may see hope and uncertainty and puzzle show in her face. You can watch them smile, and see Voldemort say quietly Avada, and watch as her hope turns to terror, and as he waits to see that terror, and to let the little six-year-old girl know that she is about to die. And then you can see him say Kedavra, and watch as the child slumps to the floor, eyes wide and lifeless. And you can know that you could have stopped it. You can see the Death Eaters shoot up the Dark Mark, and Disapperate to another home to slaughter more innocents, leaving the bodies intact, or burning the house to the ground. You can see Ron and Hermione and Dumbledore and Ginny and Snape and McGonagall and Hagrid die. And then, after three thousand people have been killed, you can wake up and watch helpless as Voldemort comes into this room and points his wand at me and says the same thing he said to that little girl. You can see the same terror and betrayal in my face. Then you can see me slump dead on the floor. And then you can see Voldemort turn to you, and in that instant as the sun rises red, you can despair as you know that you damned three thousand people for no reason but selfishness and lack of foresight.   
  
"Or you can give me that wand now, Harry."   
  
Slowly, Harry drew his wand out of his robes and held it out, trembling as he did so. Sirius stood and came forward and looked into his eyes.   
  
The wand clattered to the floor.   
  
Sirius said five more words before he died.   
  
"Thank you, Harry," Sirius whispered, and put a hand on his shoulder, not looking away as he knelt to pick up the wand. He pointed it at himself then, and a fierce pride shone in his eyes as he stared at Harry, and spoke his last two words, and fell to the floor. A ghost of three small golden keys rose out of Sirius' chest and vanished.   
  
And Harry knelt over his body and wept, but before the door appeared where no door had been before, he stood, hatred coursing through his blood, and picked up his wand. 


	2. Part Two: Out In The Cold

Part Two  
  
Disclaimer - Blast you, J.K., I said I don't own it, and if you sue me, I'll turn you into a four-foot prune!  
  
Thank you to all my wonderful reviewers! I'm too lazy to check for names now. No insult meant to anyone. You're all wonderful and I'm overjoyed to have an audience at last!  
Ten minutes until the door would appear.  
  
The torch burned lower. Harry crouched by the still form, feeling the tears like acid pour down his cheeks, eating into him, eating into his heart and his soul.  
  
"I can't do it, Sirius," he whispered, feeling a sob rise in his chest. "I can't do it. I can't. And now -" He took a ragged breath as the torch spluttered. "Now I'm all alone, and even if I succeed, even if I do get out, the Keys are gone. They're gone. How am I supposed to get back? I won't be able to."  
  
He heard Dumbledore's voice echo inside his head, but it didn't seem to echo. It was quiet, as it had been when he said it, inside that warm room - it's so cold here, Harry thought, and grasped Sirius' hand. So cold - with all its little whirring contraptions, and Fawkes sitting on his shoulder. "Anyone who leaves will be unable to return unless they have the Keyholder."  
  
"Me," Sirius had said quietly, and Dumbledore had nodded. There had been something in his eyes, something sad. Had he known? Harry didn't care. "But there's one thing I don't understand. How would someone else get a Key from me? The Key to the Ministry, or to here, or to the other homes?"  
  
Harry stopped listening. He forced the voices to stop.  
  
Just before the torch finally went out, Harry looked down at Sirius' face. There was a glistening bright drop on his cheek. A tear. That's my tear, Harry said to himself. It's mine. But he couldn't help imagine that it was Sirius', that perhaps he wasn't really dead and he was crying. Maybe he would open his eyes then and tell his godson yes, yes Harry you can do it. I'm here with you, Harry.  
  
He closed his eyes, praying to hear Sirius' voice. He heard a soft sob, and opened his eyes, and squeezed Sirius' hand.  
  
Then he realized he had been the one who had sobbed. The fantasy vanished, and he was left with the body of the last member of his family. Remus. Oh, God, how will I tell Remus?  
  
Or maybe, oh, God, how will they tell Remus? I'm all he's got left now. He can't lose me too. Hermione - Ron - the Weasleys - Dumbledore - I've got to win this. For them.  
  
Harry glanced down at Sirius and used the sleeve of his robe to wipe his tear away.  
  
And for you.  
  
The torch spluttered again, and died. Darkness fell over them. Over him.  
  
Five minutes. 


	3. Part Three: Wind

The Choice: Part III: Dark  
  
The light was gone.  
  
The wand was in his hand. It felt unfamiliar. That wand had cast an Unfogivable. He could have screamed, Why didn't you take my wand, you should have taken it, Voldemort. Now it's too late, but I don't care. I don't want it and I don't even think I need it. Take it! The wand was no longer the piece of wood that had never cast anything worse than a Reductor or the lot, and nothing stronger than a Patronus.  
  
There were four minutes. There were three minutes and fifty-six seconds. There were - damn it, how did he know how much time there was until the door opened?  
  
Sirius. He reached out, holding his godfather's cold, dead, stiffening hand. There was so little hope. There was so little.  
  
Dumbledore.Ron.Hermione.Ginny.Remus.  
  
There was so much at stake.  
  
Three minutes and seven seconds.  
  
The Keys. Oh, God, I'm never going to see them again. Without the Keys, no one can enter without one, I don't have a Key, Sirius, Sirius, oh God I'm dead, I'm going to die, I'm going to lose, they're all going to die.  
  
Two minutes and twenty-five seconds.  
  
He closed his eyes. These are the last minutes of my life. I need pictures, I need memories. Hogwarts - the only things he could think of were the boat ride across the lake that was so long ago the Common Room they'll be decorating it soon and the Great Hall I wonder if they'll give up the Inter-House Cup for me like they did for Cedric, oh God I hope not.  
  
Hermione dancing with Viktor Krum, the first time I saw her, on the train, crying about Buckbeak, Petrified, with toast before the first task, she wouldn't even skip her stupid Arithmancy to save me from the dragon.  
  
Ron laughing at Malfoy's name, with the Sorting Hat on his head, in the Chamber of Secrets, trying to warn me about Sirius, not believing me, screaming at Hermione.  
  
Ginny Ginny Ginny Ginny oh God Ginny. When I thought she was dead, lying on the floor of the Chamber, at Platform 9 ¾, dancing with Neville, smiling at me, oh Ginny Ginny Ginny oh God.  
  
Remus his face after I fainted from the dementors, teaching me the Patronus, embracing Sirius, telling me he was indeed leaving, writing to me, when he almost died last month in the attack, telling us he was okay, Sirius I'm fine don't worry, Sirius it's just a couple broken ribs, Sirius - Sirius - Sirius -  
  
Dumbledore clapping when I was Sorted telling me that to the well-organized mind, death is just the next adventure - death is just the next adventure - death is just the next adventure - 


	4. Part Four: Countdown

Ten. Fingers tightening on the wand, feeling it dig and leave imprints in his fingers.  
  
Nine. Closing his eyes, breathing deeply, and hating the clock inside his head.  
  
Eight. Feeling and hearing and tasting that he was alone, and seeing that Sirius' body was still there.  
  
Seven. Teeth gritting, and counting. Counting.  
  
Six - silence, still silence, there was nothing -  
  
Five. Last moments of his life would be silence, there wasn't any noise except -  
  
Four. A scraping noise.  
  
Three. A faint outline of light.  
  
Two. A voice. He froze, listening to it - "- no need to worry about that, my -"  
  
One. Harry's ears and eyes stopped working, his entire body froze, nothing mattered and everything was over and die, I'm going to die, you're going to die for what you made him do, it's your fault he's dead and I'm all alone, I'm alone, Sirius, tell me I'm not -  
  
Zero.  
  
The door opened. 


	5. Part Five: Open

The Choice  
  
To My...Fans? - I'm sorry for the delay we had before the previous chapter. I ought to be running faster, I just had a block and about twelve other things to do. I apologize. There ought to be two or three more parts after this, and an epilogue. Oh, and have you read Trall Dynasty? 'Cause that one ought to be taking on a tone sorta like this. Just a tone, mind, not a plot.  
  
+++++  
  
The door was open and he was standing there, in the doorway. Light was flooding in and Harry blinked, wanting to raise that wand and point it and say two words, but knowing that the plan formulated in the past few minutes was too sketchy to use yet and too good to give up on.  
  
"So," a rich and awful voice said. "So your godfather has nobly sacrificed himself. Did you give him the wand? Good, Harry. You are not the pitiful orphan you were last time I fought you. You are willing to sacrifice. How much? His life? Your life?" A pause, and the voice became silky. "The Mudblood's and the Muggle-lovers' lives?"  
  
"You can't fight me while I have this," Harry said, voice shaking, holding up his wand.  
  
"That wand is powerful," Voldemort mused. He stepped into the room and light spread throughout it. The door closed behind him without aid. "It has killed, now. But mine has killed more." He held up his own. "So perhaps you consider us even? Your blood is in me. Perhaps I am weaker for it. You were weak when I took it from you. But perhaps I have done with your essence what you could never do - because I am the stronger. Perhaps I've taken your blood and made it into something better than the original."  
  
Harry shivered. The Dark Lord approached him, silently walking across the room, but when Voldemort reached him, he ignored Harry completely, kneeling instead by Sirius.  
  
"So the Keys are lost," he said in a mock-mournful tone. "Kneel by Black beside me, Harry. Kneel here next to me and take his hand."  
  
Harry, fear sparking in him along with inspiration, did as he was told. Voldemort reached out a finger, looking away from Sirius and back at the boy beside him, and smiled coldly.  
  
Unable to move, unsure whether it was a spell or of his own weakness, Harry watched the thin finger touch his head, where his scar was.  
  
Pain wracked his body, and he recoiled, falling back, and feeling blood trickle down his forehead.  
  
"And my blood, Harry?" the Dark Lord said quietly, tilting his head and rising to his feet, facing the boy half-lying in front of him. "What have you done with my blood?"  
  
Harry didn't answer, and Voldemort smiled, moving his face closer and stepping slowly toward him. Harry backed up, pushing himself, unable to stand because it would take more time -  
  
He felt cold stone on his back. He had run into the wall.  
  
Looking around frantically, he felt a finger under his chin, pushing his head up. He looked into Voldemort's eyes and felt a shudder run through him. The pain was less this time, but the fear was more, a thousand times more. The face of his enemy was no more than an inch from his own face.  
  
"What have you done with my blood?" the Dark Lord repeated softly, and his eyes' intensity increased. The last part was a hiss: "I want it back." 


	6. Part Six: Shuffle and Lightning

The key to living well and good Is doing as you must and should Is seeing all that you may see Is knowing all that is - ought be.  
  
_My Blood Is Ink_ by Terry Aniston  
  
The Choice  
  
He wanted to recoil at the touch as the slim finger touched his forehead again, but he couldn't move.an awful picture, like a child's nightmare, had painted itself across his eyes and he was blind for it.  
  
His own hand, extended and finger pointing - pointing and Ron and Hermione and Ginny and Remus - his lips moving, saying Take them, because they cannot do what I can. Damning his soul and killing his own friends. A sacrifice, Voldemort had said.  
  
But there was another voice, another image trying to overcome the other. It was an image of Sirius holding the wand, and the look in his eyes shining pride and hope and honor. Hope because he knew that Harry could defeat the Dark Lord.  
  
The images vanished and he was again staring at Voldemort, who was in turn staring at his own finger. Harry's blood was there - red and contrasting - and as he watched, Voldemort sniffed the blood, and then brought his finger to his forehead. Like a toddler making a finger-painting, he smeared the blood on his forehead in the shape of a lightning bolt.  
  
Harry stared at the Dark Lord for a moment. Voldemort didn't seem to notice him for a moment, but then he turned his eyes to Harry and smiled, almost curiously, and for a split second there was no rage or hatred or derision in those eyes, there was only a sort of surveying acknowledgement. And then he threw his head back and began to laugh.  
  
Harry shuddered, unable to so much as blink, just watching this being. Suddenly, in front of his eyes was no longer a hideous killer. All in an instant, he had become a sixteen-year-old boy with the same dark hair as he had - no more and no less than Harry Potter was or could be.  
  
Harry felt his fingers curl around his wand, feeling life again, breathing, feeling the very obvious heartbeat in his chest. And he pointed the wand at Voldemort, and uttered one word into his puzzled and suddenly comprehending horrified face,  
  
"IObliviate./I"  
***** A.N. Ha! Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha! Now just in spite of everything I'm convinced perhaps I should end it there.  
  
What do you think? Feedback, my people! I am writing this for YOU! YOU are the true lord of the dance, no matter what those idiots at work say. YOU are the people who matter. Yes, I have a plan, but what do YOU think? Now my pinky is telling me it's time to stop capitalizing 'you' so I'm going to go. Goodbye, and feedback is a necessity! Oh, and did you like that Aniston poem? She rocks, she really does. Has anyone read her book? 


	7. Part Seven: The Wind Slows

A.N. - Huh. Standard disclaimer should have been at the beginning of every chapter. Well, we've got this chapter and that's that, I think. Hey, and I need you wonderfulnesses to do me a favor. I need to write drabbles - that's stories under 650 words, like my Brothers Forgiven one, or the A Veiled Sun collection. I need some more challenges. Give me any pairing from HP, LotR, The Matrix, Dinotopia, the Tenth Kingdom, Princess Mononoke, X-Men, (no crossovers though, and ask if you want to challenge me to an unnamed one - those're just what I can think of offhand) etc, on my LJ - check my userpage - rooted from Celebros in my LotR Heirs of the King fic. That's KEL-eh-bros. And he ROCKS!  
  
Righty. Now for the Last Chapter. Know that if the threat of the Dark Lord is gone, the Keys will not be an issue. Their locks will vanish.  
  
Chapter the Last: Tom Marvolo Riddle  
  
He watched the disbelief in Voldemorts eyes slide slowly into a last millisecond of hatred, and he opened his mouth to roar.  
  
Then the jet of light hit him in the stomach, and he stumbled back a step and let his hand fall slowly. Looking very confused, he closed his mouth and stared at Harry. A curious smile crossed his face. "Who're you?" he asked amiably. "Hell, who'm I?"  
  
A second of disbelief. He had done it. Then he came to himself. "My name is Harry," he said quietly. "And you're Tommy. There's been an accident here. There's." He wracked his brain frantically. ".my godfather's hurt." Oh, it hurt him to say that, it ached in his heart. ".and there are a bunch of criminals outside. They think you're their leader, and they're crazy. I need you to help me get out of here. Can you."  
  
*****  
  
There were too many stretchers floating behind the two darkened figures at first for the people of Hogsmeade to wonder why all of them were loosely hooded. But the two in the lead made their way slowly down the streets, where people were crowding and staring, to the church. Its contents were spilled out of the doors, and several were crying. Harry looked to the enormous sign, with hundreds of signatures, and read it over and over, his mouth forming the words.  
  
Prayer service, midnight, in honor and memory of Sirius Black and Harry Potter.  
  
And he looked at the ones who were crying more closely, and saw students and teachers, Hagrid highly visible among them, Dumbledore staring beside the half-giant, and Ron and Hermione and Ginny crying together but looking, looking not at him but at the stretcher behind him that carried Sirius. Ron was shoving his way through the crowd then, and the others behind him.  
  
"Sirius!" Ron shouted, ignoring the wind that had suddenly picked up and blown his hat off, leaving his hair violently visible. Hermione was right next to Harry then, wiping away tears and searching for her wand. She didn't recognize him under the hood, he realized dimly.  
  
"Sirius -" she was breathing, and she glanced Harry's way, still unable to see his face. "He's not.is he."  
  
"He's dead," Harry said hoarsely.  
  
"No," Ron said, shaking his head fiercely. "He's not - I don't believe you - who are you? And where's Harry?"  
  
He lowered the stretchers gently, motioning that the other, more silent figure beside him should do the same, and then reached up both hands and lowered his hood.  
  
He smiled through tears. "Right here," he said quietly.  
  
*****  
  
Auror file rid-th-17  
  
Date of first proven offense: 4/1969  
  
Full name: Thomas Marvolo Riddle  
  
Ranking priority: 1st  
  
Date of report: 10-4-1996  
  
Auror first assigned to case: Promethesus Lupin  
  
Aurors currently assigned: All Aurors, led by Arabella Figg and Tamira Lupin  
  
Report:  
  
"A Memory Charm of unbelievable strength was performed of Mr. Riddle. He is to be stripped of his magical powers and his supporters will be sent to be judged fittingly. Mr. Harry Potter performed the spell. Mr. Riddle, also known as Voldemort, is suspected to be the last Heir of Slytherin and a Parselmouth. Mr. Potter is currently recovering and helping with funeral arrangements for his godfather Sirius Black, proven innocent last month, who sacrificed himself nobly, possibly saving every wizard in Britan."  
  
*****  
  
AN2 - I am so sorry about the screw-up before! I don't know what happened, it was so messed up. Should I make a sequel? 


End file.
